Saturday, November 25, 2006

Calgary Poutine and Ice Cream

Okay, so we never ever post to the blog, but I thought I'd share my picks for some specific best-of-Calgary for people looking for this info.

Best Poutine in Calgary: This was, without a doubt, from the Garden Deli inside the Tom Baker Cancer Centre, located at the Foothills Medical Centre. The curds are real curds, and you can get double-curds, if you so desire. Unfortunately, at some point management got a little stingy on the volume of fries that went with it, but it's still the best you can get in Calgary.

Best Ice Cream in Calgary: An easy choice again: Philip's Forbidden Flavors. I haven't been there in months, so I can't guarantee that they're still there (their other location is now a bubble tea joint), but in terms of flavour, it beats every other place within the Calgary city limits, hands down. Okay, it drives me crazy that 'flavours' is misspelt in their name, but what can you do. I no longer bother with any other place, and yes, I've tried all of them, with the exception of one: I've heard that the chocolate ice cream available from Manuel Latruwe Belgian Patisserie & Bread Shop is extremely good, but they've never been open when I've tried to go there.

If I can think of any other categories to post, I will... eventually.

Monday, January 30, 2006

Road Trip!

The diners' club is roadtripping this weekend. Members, get your acts together and pick restaurants in Banff for Friday and Saturday nights!

Maybe Sunday brunch too?

Thursday, January 19, 2006

Resp Studying Contest

Announcing the first Diners' Club studying contest! The first person to finish reading the resp textbook will have their next diners' club meal paid for by me! If I win, I'll go buy myself a poutine. Get reading!

Friday, January 13, 2006

First Review 3\/0r!

Last Saturday, we headed over to Atlas at 1000 9 Ave SW. Now, in a regular restaurant review, you'd expect to get a list of everything we ordered, how they tasted, some photos to show off the dishes, and a nice conclusion. Insert humour into a few locations in the review, and you're satisfied. Well, unfortunately, yours truly showed himself to be a true amateur. I didn't bring a camera, so there'll be no photos of the food here, I didn't write down what everyone ordered, and finally, I didn't even try everyone else's dishes! So, I'll do my best here, and promise to do better next time.

We made reservations for 7:00, which turned out to be very lucky, since the restaurant was quite full, and a crowd of other people arrived at the same time as us. We got our table, and spent a little time waiting for the rest of our party to show.

Naturally, we started with drinks. Three of us ordered the doogh, with mint. I've drunk this before, and in general, I find that it is an acquired taste; personally, I'm used to the gentle flavour of ayran. Well, I think that this was the best mint doogh I've ever drunk. Perhaps it was more ayran-like than usual.

Next came the food. I ordered the combination stew plate for $12.99, which gave me a choice of any three stews. I ordered the fesenjoon, the bamiyah, and the badinjan. I was satisfied with all three. Fesenjoon is, of course, unique to Persion cuisine, with its pomegranate and walnut sauce. The bamiyah, an okra stew, was a bit sweeter than I expected, but had excellent texture. Of the three, the badinjan was my favourite, which great eggplant texture and flavour. Frankly, this was a pretty good deal.

Magic pants also had the stew plate, but had the split pea and beef stew instead of badinjan. He says that it was different than the other stews, and good.

The Taboo Twins ordered a platter of kebaps, and they looked pretty good from my side of the table. Down There also got kebaps, and I think they were the same as the Taboo Twins kebaps. She was full afterwards, so the volume of meat was quite big.

Finally, Dr. DRE ordered a plate of fesenjoon and his Candiru had a plate of bamiyah. They seemed satisfied. I wonder though, a whole plate of fesenjoon seems a bit intense for me. Thinking about it, I don't think I was crazy about the texture of the meat in the fesenjoon, but it may just have been my love of eggplant and okra that biased me against it.

For dessert, two items were ordered. One was a vermicelli and ice dish, with rosewater and lemon. Nice and refreshing. The other was saffron ice cream. Nice, if you're into that. I liked the chunks of buttermilk mixed in, mmm.

So, overall, I'd say that I enjoyed my evening at Atlas. The atmosphere was nice, the prices were not steep, given the quantity and quality of food, and the service was friendly and helpful. The stew combination plate I ordered was one of the more expensive items on the menu, so others dishes were an even better deal. I recommend Atlas, if you're looking for Persian in Calgary.

Friday, January 06, 2006

Tacos?

Maybe we should go to Taco Town next meeting.

Persian

Welcome to the new Tuatara Diners' Club blog. Tomorrow's meeting will be at 'Atlas', at 100-1000 9 Avenue SW, at 7 p.m.. Soit là, où soit carré.